CDC’s investments in low-income and fragile states

The UK’s multi-billion pound development finance institution did not do enough to maximise the impact of its UK aid investments.

Score: Amber/Red
  1. Status: Completed
  2. Published: 26 March 2019
  3. Type: Performance review
  4. Subject: Development finance
  5. Assessment: Amber/Red
  6. Location: Kenya, Malawi, Nigeria, Tanzania
  7. Lead commissioner: Richard Gledhill
  8. SDGs covered:No poverty, Decent work and economic growth

Read the approach paper

Our approach

We set out to cover the period from 2012 to 2018. The review explores how well CDC has reoriented its investment approach and portfolio to achieve development impact in low-income and fragile states, while still delivering its intended financial return. It builds on previous parliamentary and National Audit Office (NAO) reviews of CDC. Our primary focus was on CDC’s ability to deliver results in low-income and fragile states.

For this review we conducted a literature review, a review of CDC’s corporate processes, a review of six investment teams and in-depth reviews of 19 investments, as well as four country visits where we conducted interviews with investee company staff, visited company sites and interviewed stakeholders.

Review questions

Through a combination of a literature review, corporate and investment team reviews and country case studies, we assessed the following questions:

  1. Does CDC have a credible approach to achieving development impact and financial returns in low-income and fragile states?
  2. How effective are CDC’s investments in low-income and fragile states?
  3. How well does CDC learn and innovate?

Timeline

Approach

Published 29 May 2018

Evidence gathering

Complete

Review publication

Published 26 March 2019

Government response

Published 7 May 2019

Parliamentary scrutiny

IDC hearing 22 May 2019

ICAI follow-up

Published 23 July 2020

Further follow-up

Published 23 June 2021